


Just a Little Bit

by anyanka_eg



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-01-01
Updated: 2012-07-04
Packaged: 2017-11-09 04:19:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 2
Words: 14,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/451193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anyanka_eg/pseuds/anyanka_eg
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve's confident that he can wrap up the open and shut case the Governor assigns to the team one Sunday in just a few hours. After all, HPD have the only suspect in custody before he even arrives on the scene. Nothing in his previous training has prepared him for what he finds and how he reacts to it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This turned out to be really tough to write, not really because of the subject matter, but due to various real life issues that kept me from writing pretty much at all for about six months. I hope it's still worth a read none the less.
> 
> This story deals with child abuse, which all happens off screen, and the effects of it on the victim and family so please don't read this if it will trigger things for you. Mild spoilers for the whole of season 2, but nothing specific.
> 
> I also have to thank my beta, my mum. I know, very odd getting her to do it, but it worked well and she did it at short notice so many, many thanks to her.
> 
> I also have to thank the amazing danceswithgary for her art work. She was very brave to pick my story as it's not an easy or obvious story to work with. She's managed to produce something amazing, that's creepy without being horrifically graphic. Despite it not being graphic, it's behind the cut never the less.

[  
Click for fullsize](http://ic.pics.livejournal.com/anyanka_eg/10851552/67303/original.jpg)  
She was shaking. Couldn't stop. There was so much blood. Everywhere. Her ears were ringing from the shots. Lots of shots. So loud. She should put the gun away and clean up the mess. Clean up, baby girl, or daddy will be mad. Except he wouldn't because he was on the floor. She felt a giggle burst up out of her chest. She put her hand to her mouth to stifle it. She tasted burning. Maybe she should run away, but she didn't have anywhere to go? No, best to stay where she was and wait for someone to tell her what she was supposed to do now.

****************************************************************************************

Steve was elbow deep in the engine of the Marquis when his phone rang. He debated ignoring it, calling whoever it was back later, but he knew in reality he'd never finish the job if he did because he'd be worrying it was something important. What if one of the team needed him urgently? What if Danny needed to bring Grace to the house because his apartment was a rat hole?

He disentangled the still unattached drive belt and pulled it from the engine, standing up and stretching out the kinks in his spine. He dropped the belt on the workbench, and gave his hands a quick scrub on a none too clean rag before he picked up the phone. “McGarrett.”

“Commander,” Governor Denning said, by way of greeting. “I'm sorry to disturb your weekend but there's a case I need you to look in to.”

“Yes sir,” Steve said, already running through scenarios in his head, noting the time and assessing where his team would be.

“There's been a double homicide out in Waikane,” he said, sounding tired and worn down. “I wouldn't normally call you for what seems to be a domestic incident, especially as they have the shooter in custody, but one of the victims, Austin Jervis, was a prosecutor in the Career Criminal Division. I'm sure there's no connection to his work, but I'd like you to run the inquiry and make certain.”

“I understand your worry, sir,” Steve assured the governor, already heading up the stairs to change out of his oily clothes. “You said they have the perp?”

“HPD arrived to find the sixteen year old daughter of the home owner with the gun in her hand,” Denning sighed, and Steve guessed the other man didn't want it to be some kid throwing their life away any more than he did. “She's not talking though, so I asked them to just hold her and the scene until you get there.”

“I'll call the team and be there in thirty minutes,” Steve said, knowing Danny would fume at the thought of the speed he'd have to drive to get there.

“Thank you,” Denning said, sounding a little happier than when he'd first called. “I'll get the address sent to your phone.”

Denning disconnected the call without further comment, and that was something Steve liked about the man. No unnecessary words, no false friendliness. He just passed on his orders, gave the information needed to carry them out, and left Steve to do the rest. After Jameson's betrayal of what Steve had thought of as a friendship, albeit a slightly odd one, he was quite happy to work for someone who expected nothing more than he do the job he was paid for.

Steve stripped out of his wife beater and cut off jeans, throwing them in the laundry hamper, before stepping into the bathroom and quickly washing the worst of the grease and dirt from his hands and face. His hair still damp at the edges, and his skin barely any dryer, when he grabbed a black tee and a clean pair of cargoes a couple of minutes later.

He pulled them on, running through his plans for how to handle the case. Danny had Grace this weekend so there was no way Steve was going to disturb his precious few hours with his daughter unless he absolutely had to. The same went for Chin who was spending the weekend with Malia. If the case was as open and shut as it sounded then he wouldn't have to disrupt everyone’s weekend. With Lori gone it only left Kono, but she was fair game though, he thought with a grin. It was tough being the rookie again.

******************************************************************************************

Steve parked his truck in the secluded drive of the isolated Waikane house thirty two and a half minutes later, still fuming about the tourist bus with engine trouble that had traffic backed up along the Kahekili Highway. Kono's car was there already, surfboards in the rack on the roof, and Steve felt a slight pang of guilt at interrupting her precious free time.

He slammed the door of the truck and stamped over to the young officer standing on the edge of the lawn in front of the house. Before he could say anything the man spoke. “Officer Kalakaua's inside, sir.”

“Thanks,” Steve replied, and then remembered how Danny always spoke to the first responders to get their thoughts on the scene. “Did you answer the call?”

“Yes, sir,” the Officer, Brady according to his name tag, said. “Me and my partner. It's a mess in there. The girl, she was just standing there with the gun in her hand. Hasn't said a word since we got here.”

“And there was no one else around when you arrived?”

“No. Billy, I mean Officer Kama, searched the area as soon as we secured the house and I stayed with the girl. Once backup arrived we did a better search but there was no one around.”

Steve glanced quickly around the exterior of the neat little house. The garden seemed to be a lush, untamed jungle, but he knew enough about his mother's attempts to create the same effect that it didn't happen without a lot of work. He'd examine the garden himself to see what it could tell him after he'd seen the inside of the house and spoken to the girl. The suspect, he told himself.

“Thanks,” Steve said, nodding at Officer Brady and heading inside.

The front door lead directly into the open living room of the house. It was a stylish space, all cool island tones and dark wood, but it's pristine, magazine-spread quality was ruined by the bloodbath in front of the fireplace. Kono was standing in the center of it, taking pictures of two dead men where they lay, the flash of the camera lighting the scene in horrifying detail every few seconds. Jesus, how could a kid do this to her father?

“Hey,” Kono greeted him quietly, her normally ebullient mood absent in the face of the carnage.

“What have we got?”

“Two victims,” she stated, lowering the camera and gesturing to the men in turn. “The home owner, Mathew Hale and a visitor, Austin Jervis. Max is on his way to confirm this, but I think we can say they both died of gunshot wounds. The neighbors called it in when they heard the gunshots. They wouldn't normally have heard anything as they're about half a mile away but they were fixing up the fencing on the edge of this property.”

“Did they see anything?”

“No, just heard a whole bunch of gunshots,” Kono answered with a shake of her head. “They called nine one one and high-tailed it back to their house.”

Steve looked at the mess of blood and brains spattered over the floor, and the bullet holes dotting the walls. “Wise move.”

“Yeah, these shots are wild.” She pointed at five bullet holes that were dotted across the wall over the fire. “There's two more holes over there, near the bookcase and there's a smashed window at the back. I think it was just bad luck that both of these guys died.”

“The daughter's not said anything?” Steve asked, wondering where the girl was. It still surprised him that someone could wave a gun around and kill people when they were just sixteen years old. He remembered being sixteen himself, and as angry and hurt as he was at being sent away, he would never have hurt anyone, especially not his dad.

“I don’t think so,” Kono said sadly. “Billy Kama's with her in her bedroom.” He set off towards the stairs but Kono called him back. “Wait. Steve, she's kind of shut down, like there was no one inside. I think something really bad's happened to her.”

“She shot her dad,” Steve replied, pretty sure someone who killed a parent probably should be freaked out.

“Maybe,” Kono admitted, but Steve could tell something was really bothering her.

“What's your gut saying?”

“Not sure,” she said, looking frustrated. “There's something though. Something, I don't know, hinky.”

“You'll work it out,” Steve told her with a quick smile, because he was a supportive team leader, despite what Danny sometimes yelled at him. He also had a lot of faith in Kono's feelings about people and places. She'd always read suspects well, and her instincts had been honed with eighteen months of Five-0 cases.

“The kid was doing everything the HPD guys were telling her but it was like she'd retreated behind some pretty huge walls. Billy's usually great with people, kids especially. Real great guy. But even he wasn't getting anywhere.” She rolled her eyes at the questioning eyebrow he raised. “Get your mind out of the gutter, McGarrett. He was in my class at the academy, and his boyfriend would be pretty pissed if I put the moves on him.”

“Okay,” Steve said, his hands up in mock surrender. He knew when he was being told to back off for a while, both from questioning the kid and tormenting Kono about her love life. Or lack of one. “I'm going to have a look around, get a feel for the place. I'll talk to the daughter after that.”

“Sure thing, boss.” She smiled, a sad parody of her usual bright grin and went back to photographing the living room. Steve headed towards the back of the house, where he assumed the kitchen must be. He could help Kono process the scene but she was more than capable of doing it herself, and he wanted to see if the house, and eventually the daughter, would set off alarm bells like they had done for Kono.

**********************************************************************************************

“Ho, McGarrett,” a voice shouted behind him. He turned around, pretty happy to leave his fruitless search of the cluttered garage, and saw sergeant Palakiko waving him over to the end of the drive where a small group of people were gathered.

Steve scanned the faces of the crowd, noticing mostly people who were there when he arrived. Neighbors, he guessed. There was one man though that he hadn't seen, and he was standing next to Palakiko, something that suggested to Steve that the stranger was the reason he was being called over.

“Sergeant,” he greeted the uniformed officer, as he strode over. “What've you got?”

“This is Dr. John Anderson, the girl's psychiatrist,” Palakiko said, gesturing at the man by his side. “He's got some information you need to hear.”

“Psychiatrist?” Steve asked, more than a little suspicious that the guy was here.

"I'm Matt's emergency contact," the psychiatrist explained, obviously sensing Steve's concern about his sudden appearance at the crime scene. "I got a call once HPD ascertained it was Matt that had been killed."

"I can't let you in to the crime scene," Steve said, keen to get rid of the guy and get back to his investigation. Identifications needed to be done at the morgue and not out in the field. Civilians didn't need to see their friends and family with their blood spread all over their homes. They didn't need memories like that.

"I realize that, Commander McGarrett. That's not why I'm here. I came to offer my expertise in dealing with his daughter. She's a very troubled child and needs careful handling. Especially in this situation."

"I'm afraid that won't be possible," Steve insisted, hoping he wasn't jumping the gun by telling him what he was about to. "It's too early to be certain but we consider her the prime suspect right now."

"I suspected as much," Dr Anderson sighed.

Steve felt the smoldering anger in his chest burst to flame. Had this guy known the girl was dangerous and done nothing? "What do you mean?”

“Alison is...well I shouldn't really talk about it of course, but I do feel that I have to share this so you aren't taken in by her manipulations. She's very clever, very good at telling people exactly what they need to hear to get her own way.”

Steve hoped his surprise at what he was being told wasn't showing on his face. He'd been expecting the psychiatrist to try to explain away the kid's, Alison's, actions with some stupid excuse about her being sick, or having suffered abuse. She'd shot her dad, and there wasn't any excuse for that. "How much can you tell me without breaking confidentiality rules?"

"A lot," the psychiatrist answered. "When a crime's been committed or we know (a crime) might be committed then we have an obligation to tell the police. I know that some therapists don't, and are very reluctant to share anything with the 2police. I work with some very troubled youngsters so I know that sometimes passing on information to the 3police is an option. Perhaps the best option."

"That's very noble of you," Steve said, wishing he didn't find the man's eagerness to help just a little creepy. Yes, he wanted the information about the girl, and he'd be cursing and making threats if the doctor had been unwilling to pass it on, but somehow the polished cooperation was setting his teeth on edge. “Perhaps we should go inside and you can tell me what I need to know.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Kono wasn't happy with the crime scene. Not that she was ever 'happy' at a crime scene, but there was a certain sense of being able to put the pieces together that she liked, the meticulous gathering of information that let them find the bad guys and put them behind bars. This one though? This was all wrong. Maybe it was the fact that a kid had shot her dad that unsettled her, but she didn't think it so. Steve had said to trust her instincts and she was going to do just that.

She was the only one in the house now that Steve and the kid's psychiatrist had left. And Dr Anderson was another niggle in Kono's instincts. She couldn't say what it was, as he seemed perfectly pleasant, good at his job, and truly regretful that Alison had done what she had, despite his efforts with her. But still there was something that set off alarm bells, albeit quiet ones, in Kono's head.

Max and the bodies had followed the cruiser taking the girl downtown and Kono felt better knowing Billy Kama was still with her. She grinned a little at the memory of Steve's face when he first saw Billy. The guy was big, six five at least, and built in a way that made Steve look kind of scrawny. Kono knew, from bitter experience on the training mat, the man could move with more grace and finesse than a ballet dancer but threw punches like Mike Tyson.

But it wasn't Billy's size, or the fact that he was smoking hot, that Kono was grateful for. It was his quiet calm that seemed to roll over everyone else and put them at ease, especially kids. Even animals seemed happier around him. People, okay mostly Danny, teased Chin about being some kind of Zen master, but Billy made Chin look like an angry Jersey devil. Kono snorted at her own joke, and then shook her head in annoyance.

She needed to process the scene really carefully, especially if she was going to find whatever it was that was pinging her weird-o-meter.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“So what you're saying is that she's a psychopath?” Steve asked, swinging the truck round the corner with the last glimmer of the yellow traffic signal.

“Ummm,” Dr Anderson managed, his white-knuckled grip on the oh-shit handle giving Steve a burst of perverse joy. “It's difficult to be definitive about it with children, but she does seem to present that way.”

“But shouldn't she come from a more broken background? I know her mother died but doesn't it usually require abuse or real trauma to create a psychopath?”

“Contrary to what you see on TV it's not always the way,” the psychiatrist said with a smug little smile. “In fact there's increasing evidence that environmental factors are much less important than genetic ones.”

“Okay,” Steve said, switching lanes quickly and taking the turn fast enough that Danny would have been shrieking if he were in the truck. “But how does that help me question her?”

“Well, firstly I would suggest that I accompany you in the interview,” Dr Anderson said, bracing his shoulder against the passenger window. “I know the way she lies, the little manipulations that you won't be expecting.”

“I'm not sure that's such a good idea.”

“I know you think you can read people pretty well, and I'm sure you can, but all your experience in life is going to be telling you to believe the things she's saying because she's a little girl who looks like she wouldn't hurt a fly.”

Steve thought he might be right about that. Alison was tiny. She was probably at most four feet ten inches tall, and, as stick thin as she was, couldn't be more than seventy pounds. She had long blonde hair, and the biggest blue eyes he'd ever seen. Steve was man enough to admit, to himself at least, that Officer Kama standing next to her probably made her look even smaller, because he was sure there were giants who felt inadequate next to the man. “I'll concede that. I'm not agreeing yet, but what other pointers can you offer.”

“She'll probably clam up completely,” Anderson said, looking relieved as the Iolani Palace came into view. “She's learned that she can get her own way a lot by making herself small and vulnerable looking, letting people imagine all the ways she couldn't have done what they're accusing her of. If she does talk, she'll most likely spin some story of abuse and neglect so awful that it would have Hitler weeping in sympathy.”

“She's not got any tells?” Steve asked, sliding the truck into his parking space.

“None, other than I think when she's looking her most truthful she's probably lying. She killed the family cat last year, beat the poor creature to death, and I'm pretty sure she would have passed a polygraph if we'd made her take one. Eventually she told me it had scratched her and she was mad at it.”

“Jesus,” Steve breathed, wondering how such a cute looking kid could do something so awful. “Okay, here's what we're going to do. I'm going to question her on my own and you can be a second set of eyes watching the video feed. If I don't get anywhere with her, then you can come in and try.”

“That seems very reasonable, Commander,” Dr Anderson agreed, opening the door and getting out of the truck. “Matt was my friend and I do feel responsible for this in a way. I should have insisted that he take more aggressive treatment seriously.”

“It's not your fault,” Steve assured him, striding up the steps to the palace. “From what I've read psychopaths know right from wrong, they just choose not to follow the same rules as the rest of us. She did this herself, with no help from you.”

“Thank you, Commander,” the psychiatrist said, with a sigh. “But I think it's going to take me a while to get over it. Making sure Alison can't hurt anyone else is the best I can do now.”

Steve could get behind that. The thing he hated most about the cases they worked was that the majority of what they did was reactive, solving a crimes usually after some poor bastard had been killed. Some days he'd like to save people before they were victims, maybe even save the criminals from themselves.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Kono looked around Alison's bedroom, deeply confused by what she saw. Or rather, what she didn't. There was no computer, no cell phone, no TV or DVD player, nothing that you'd expect of a sixteen year old girl. The psychiatrist had given them a little background, like the kid being home-schooled, so surely she needed someway to stay in touch with her friends? She'd seen a laptop downstairs in what was obviously the victim's study, maybe the kid used that. She'd have to check it later.

The bedroom was girly. Too girly. Okay, so Kono had been on the pro-surf circuit for a couple of years before she reached sixteen but she didn't think she'd been anything other than normal in how her bedroom looked. She'd had some of the same childish things, stuffed animals, some books, maybe even a few dolls hidden away in drawers, but she'd also had posters of NSYNC, 98 Degrees and Keanu Reeves. There were none in Alison's room.

The walls were painted pink, with a flowery trim that was picked up on the comforter and curtains. There was a neat row of stuffed toys on the bed, nestling amongst what Kono thought was an alarming amount of throw pillows. The furniture was all obviously a matching set, all white with heart shaped scroll work, that screamed Disney princess to Kono. It was all wrong. It was the bedroom of a little kid, not a teenager.

Given the magazine perfect décor in the whole house, including this room, it couldn't be a case of there being no money for redecorating. And a few posters wouldn't have cost that much. No, something was very wrong with the whole scene. It was time to call in the big guns.

Kono pulled out her cell, swiped to unlock it and thumbed through her contacts. Chin first and then Danny. She hated disturbing them but if something was as wrong as it felt then she was going to need help at the scene and no doubt Steve would appreciate Danny's experience with kids in the interview.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Look, we know you killed him,” Steve said, fighting all his instincts which were telling him to go over and comfort the little kid who was cuffed to the chair in the interview room. “But if you explain why, tell me what made you do it, then I'll guarantee that you get sentenced as a juvenile.”

Alison didn't answer, continuing the silent resistance that had started even before they had gotten to headquarters. Hell, she wasn't even looking at him, just staring at her shoes like none of this mattered. Steve wanted to shake her, make her understand what she'd done, what she'd lost.

“If you don't talk to me, you're going to be tried as an adult,” Steve pointed out, hoping a jolt of reality might get through to her. “I know you think that you'd get away with it, that no one would believe that you could kill two men, but I am going to personally make sure that every member of that jury knows exactly what kind of monster you are.”

Steve bent down, hooked his finger under the kid's chin and tilted her face up and, looking at her directly in the eye, whispered. “You're never, ever going to see the light of day again.”

She didn't even flinch. He'd made grown men weep in that chair and this kid was just looking at him like he wasn't there. The psychiatrist was right, she was proving to be a lot tougher to crack than he'd ever thought. Maybe he should get the guy in to help after all.

Except he wasn't willing to concede defeat just yet. She might be tough, she was certainly a killer, but he was a SEAL for god's sake. He'd been trained to resist interrogation and torture so he knew all the tricks she was probably employing, even though she was self taught. Well, two could play at that game.

He wasn't going to touch her, not physically, both because he knew Danny would kill him if he found out, but also there wasn't any part of him that could hurt a kid, no matter what they'd done. But he was going to use all the plays he'd learned in Naval Intelligence, and some he'd learned right here from his colleagues.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Danny almost missed the parking spot as he slammed on his brakes and slid the car to a stop outside the Iolani Palace. He was pissed. Really pissed. Some of it was because he'd had to cut his Grace time short, but most of it was directed at Steve for not calling him sooner. They were partners, after all, which implied they were supposed to work together. More importantly though, Steve had zero experience questioning kids, and if what Kono thought might be true, then this wasn't some ordinary kid.

He slammed the door of the car harder than he needed too, pushing the button on the fob to lock it as he jogged up the stairs to the entrance. The halls were quiet as she strode through them, all the admins and clerks he generally greeted with a smile thankfully absent. He didn't think he was going to manage much of a smile today.

He pushed the doors to the Five 0 offices open, making them bounce off their cushioned stops and back closed with a clang. The man he assumed was the psychiatrist Kono had told him about jumped and spun around to stare at him.

“You,” Danny ordered, pointing at the man. “Out!”

The man froze where he was, his mouth opening to speak before he closed it again without making a sound. Danny was about to re-issue the order when he saw the other man spot his badge on his belt and relax a little. “I'm here with Commander McGarrett. I'm Alison's psychiatrist.”

“I know exactly who you are, Dr Anderson,” Danny said, continuing to walk towards the other man. “And I still want you out of here.”

“Commander McGarrett wants my help,” the psychiatrist said, his voice taking on a soothing tone that he probably thought was going to calm Danny down. “I think you should check with him before you make any rash judgments.”

“Rash judgments?” Danny scoffed, happy to find a target for his fury. “Rash judgments like questioning a vulnerable witness in a threatening environment? Like basing your interview on information that any half decent defense lawyer will get thrown out before a trial starts because no doctor should be giving confidential details to anybody, let alone the police? How about rash judgments like throwing away your career in your eagerness to convict someone you're supposed to have been helping?”

“Now just a minute,” Anderson started, his cheeks flushing with anger. “I came here of my own free will to offer my expertise to Commander McGarrett, who, I might add, has been more than happy with the help, and I won't be spoken to like this by someone who hasn't even bothered to introduce themselves.”

“Oh, I am sorry,” Danny said sarcastically, rolling his eyes at the idiot. “Where are my manners? I'm Detective Danny Williams, and I'm going to be arresting you if you don't leave now.”

“Arresting me? For what?” The man crossed his arms and tried to look like he was settling in for the evening, but Danny could see the doubt, and maybe a little fear, flickering across his face. He was willing to bet that this guy had something to hide that he really didn't want to allow arrest to expose.

“I'm sure I can think of something,” Danny said, pulling some zip-ties from his pocket when the psychiatrist didn't make any move to leave. “Let's start with trespass and go from there.”

“Alright,” Anderson said, putting his hands up in surrender. “I'll leave, but I assure you Commander McGarrett will have me back once he realizes he's not getting anywhere with the girl.”

“Not if I've got anything to do with it,” Danny muttered under his breath, as the psychiatrist headed for the exit.

Once he was sure the man had gone he turned towards the screen and the tech-table, both of which showed the feed from the interview room. Christ! Steve had the kid handcuffed to the chair. She didn't look scared though, which started all kinds of alarm bells ringing in Danny's head. She looked like she'd checked out, sent her mind off somewhere safe while her body suffered whatever the world threw at it.

“I guess if you won't talk to me, then I'll just bring someone in who knows how to get through to you,” Steve said, his voice a little tinny over the video feed. “Your psychiatrist is out there waiting to help me find out why you did what you did.”

The camera wasn't at the best angle, something he'd get Chin to fix later, but even over the video feed Danny caught the flicker of terror that crossed the kid's face. That wasn't fear of being found out, that was genuine horror at the thought of being in the same room as Anderson and Danny wanted to kick himself for not cuffing the man and throwing him in the cells. There was something really sinister going on, and he was betting he knew at least some of it.

He would catch up with the good Dr Anderson later though, the first priority was to save the kid from Steve's clueless attentions.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Steve had his hand on the handle when the door swung open and he found himself face to face with Danny. And he looked really pissed. Steve was going to kill whomever it was that had called his partner away from his daughter. There was no need for Danny to be here.

“What the hell were you thinking?” Danny snapped, pushing past Steve and walking over to the girl. “Sometimes I despair, I really do.”

It wasn't what he'd expected his partner to say at all, and for a few moments he was frozen to the spot. Time enough for Danny to undo the handcuffs holding his suspect in the chair. “Danny...”

“Don't even speak,” Danny ordered, turning back around and fixing Steve with a death glare. “There are no words you can use that would explain away how stupid you've been.”

“Danny...” Steve tried again.

“I told you not to speak,” Danny said, holding up his finger as though he was going to put it over his lips. “I meant it. You will not say another word in front of me or Alison. You've done enough damage already.”

“But...”

“Zip it, Steve. I mean it. Right now. Shut the fuck up, pardon my French Alison, or I will have you escorted out of here. I will call Denning and tell him exactly what you've done, and I swear to god if he doesn't sack you, I'll resign.”

Steve gaped. What was Danny talking about? His partner was serious, that much Steve knew, but after that it was a complete mystery. There was no way the Governor was going to do anything other than congratulate them in wrapping up the situation and showing it had nothing to do with the dead prosecutor's cases.

Danny took Steve's silence as acquiescence and turned to the girl, crouching down to talk to her. “Alison, my name's Danny, and I want to apologize for how you've been treated today. How about we get out of here and maybe get you a soda or something?”

Alison didn't speak, but she did look at Danny, making more eye contact than she had in the two hours that Steve had been speaking to her. He opened his mouth to tell his partner that she was a psychopath, that she was going to lie to him, but Danny flashed him a look that spoke volumes. He shut his mouth with a snap.

“That's it,” Danny said to the girl, ushering her out of the seat with out actually touching her. “Let's go into my office and sit on some nice comfy chairs. You want a soda? Course you do. How about I send my goof of a partner to get you one? You want a coke?”

Danny steered the girl past Steve and out of the interrogation room, keeping up a stream of words and pointless questions as they carried on down the corridor, across the bullpen and into his office. Steve followed several paces behind, wondering just when things had gotten away from him.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Danny watched Alison from behind his desk. He was quite happy to sit in silence with her until she decided to talk. Steve was pacing outside like some mad zoo animal, and Danny thought about closing the blinds so he and, more importantly Alison, didn't have to watch the guy wear a rut in the floor. But he figured closing the blinds might also be something that made the kid think bad things were going to happen.

She was petting the stuffed toy Grace had left in his office and never collected. To be fair to his daughter he couldn't really blame her for leaving it behind. He thought it was supposed to be a cow, but really wasn't sure. It had long gangly legs, something that was possibly supposed to be udders but kind of looked like a weird growth, and most bizarrely of all was constructed of pastel pink and green spotted fabric. It was a gift from the governor following Grace's abduction. But he'd forgiven the man for it because it had obviously been bought by an aide, if Denning's quickly disguised look of horror on seeing it was anything to go by. Alison seemed to find it comforting at least.

“Will my cat be okay?” Alison asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

As far as Danny knew it was the first thing she'd said since the shooting and he felt a sudden sense of gratitude to whichever member of the governor's staff had bought the ugly toy. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Steve move to the tech table, obviously going to watch the video feed of the office.

“I'll make sure it is,” Danny told her, squashing the urge to add any of the endearments. Who knew what she'd been called in the past and what memories it might trigger.

“I promise to be good,” she said, meeting his gaze for the first time since they'd got to the office, like she wanted him to see how earnest she was.

Danny held his breath for a moment, just to stop himself cursing in front of the kid. He'd been pretty sure before she spoke that she'd been abused, but now he was certain. He blew out the breath and tried to school his body to not show just how angry he was. “I'll make sure it's fine no matter what you do.”

“It's okay,” Alison said, her hand tight around the toy. “I know I've been bad.”

He was about to answer her, when his phone buzzed on his desk. He sighed, knowing the message would be from Steve but picked it up anyway because the idiot would burst in within seconds if he didn't. He unlocked the screen and read the text.

Anderson says she killed the cat

Danny sighed. He wanted to send Steve away, keep him busy with something else, because this type of investigation wasn't his partner's strong suit. In fact, the team hadn't had to deal with something exactly like this yet and he was worried about the effect it might have on Steve and Kono. He couldn’t think of any way to get Steve out of the office, however, so he settled for sending him a quick text.

Hoping he's just incompetent. So shuld you. B quiet

Alison was still watching him, her gaze assessing. Danny wondered for a brief moment if Steve was right, if in fact she was playing him, but dismissed it. Just because a kid had been abused didn't mean she couldn't be smart. He just hoped whatever she was looking for in him she found because he really needed her to talk to him.

“Daddy's dead, isn't he?” she asked, quietly.

“Yes,” Danny said honestly, because what else could he say? “And the other guy there too.”

“I didn't mean to,” Alison said, holding the cow thing to her chest. “I just...”

Danny waited for her to finish the sentence but she didn't. It was an admission of guilt, and when he looked over he could see Steve avidly watching the screen in the bullpen. Danny wondered again if he should insist that there was a lawyer present for her. She hadn't asked for one, but he wasn't entirely comfortable letting a kid, even if she was technically old enough to make her own choices, confess to shooting two people.

“Alison...” Danny started.

“Bit.”

“Huh?”

“Everyone calls me Little Bit,” she said, nervously. Danny must have looked confused because she quickly added an explanation. “On account of me being so small. Daddy always said I was just a little bit of a girl.”

“Should I call you Bit?” Danny asked, pretty sure he wasn't comfortable with using any nickname her father had used.

She didn't reply right away, and Danny could see she was actually thinking about her answer. He wondered if he was giving her the first real choice of her young life. After a few minutes of silence she squared her shoulders and gave him her answer. “I'd like you to call me Alison.”

Danny grinned at her. “Well, okay then, Alison.”

“And I'd like to tell you what happened today.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“And then what happened?” Danny's voice was quiet and Steve had to turn up the volume on the video feed again.

He was fighting a desperate urge to rush into Danny's office and start asking the questions that needed answers, not the stupid ones about what the kid had for breakfast or what she'd been thinking when she'd woken up. He thanked his lucky stars again that at least Danny has stopped offering her a lawyer. If she got a lawyer they'd stop her talking and Steve couldn't stand that idea.

“Daddy's friend arrived,” Alison answered, and Steve let out a breath he hadn't realized he was holding. Finally they were getting to the meat of the confession.

“Had he visited you before?” Danny asked.

Yet another pointless question. He refused to think that part of the reason he was so angry was that Danny was getting the kid to actually talk, even if it was a pack of lies. He refused to be jealous, Danny had an unfair advantage after all. He had a daughter and knew how to talk to kids.

“Yes,” Alison admitted, almost a whisper.

“Did you like his visits?”

“No,” Alison said sadly, her eyes filling with tears that Steve would have been convinced were real if he didn't know better. “He was mean.”

“How was he mean to you?”

She didn't answer. Instead big fat tears spilled down her cheeks and Steve felt an unsettling urge to comfort her, tell her it was all going to be alright. Danny pulled out a pristine handkerchief from his pocket and passed it over to her. She pressed it to her face, as though she was embarrassed by the tears, and sobbed quietly.

Steve was surprised that Danny, who was obviously buying the act, didn't sit next to her on the sofa, didn’t comfort her physically, didn't even touch her like he'd done with other kids. Instead he sat on his chair, seemingly unmoved, facing her.

“He was bigger than daddy and he enjoyed making me cry when it hurt.”

Steve froze. He thought about running the video back to make sure he'd heard her accusation correctly but Danny was speaking again.

“Did he do that today?” Danny asked, his voice calm.

How could his partner be so controlled? Surely, if he was buying the girl's story then he'd be angry at what her father had done. But if he didn't buy it, which Steve had already discounted, then why was he pandering to her at all?

“No,” Alison said, her voice a little stronger than before. “I said I didn't want to. Daddy said he'd buy me a new cat if I did, but I didn't want another one after what he did to Jinxy. And I was scared what he'd do to Boss Cat. Then he said I should because he told me to and he's my daddy, but I shouldn't have to do things that hurt just because he said so, should I?”

Danny didn't answer right away, and Steve could see him take a breath and hold it, the only sign he wasn't as calm as he looked. He blew it out with a sigh. “No, Alison, you shouldn't.”

Steve didn't have time to react to Danny's words as the doors to the Five-0 offices opened with a muffled clang and he turned to see the other half of the team, their faces grim.

“Chin, I thought you were with Malia?” Steve said, by way of greeting.

“Kono called me,” Chin replied, not sounding in the least annoyed at having his weekend away with this new wife disturbed. “And I'm glad she did.”

“Not you too?” Steve snapped, not really understanding where the sudden lack of trust had come from.

“I'm glad she called me,” Chin explained, the sharpness of his tone cutting through Steve's anger. “Because it meant she didn't have to look through the child porn I found on Hale's hard drive.”

“What?” Steve breathed. It couldn't be true.

“I've spent the past hour at the lab cracking the encryption on the disc. As soon as I confirmed what it was, I came back over here.”

“Confirmed?” Steve couldn't quite fathom how everyone else seemed to see it when he hadn't. How could he have been so blind?

“Kono called it from the way the house looked,” Chin said, glancing at his cousin who looked like she took no satisfaction in being right. “But for Danny and I, it's experience.”

“Jesus.” Suddenly he felt sick. He'd shouted at the poor kid, tried to pressure her into telling him what he wanted to hear, what he thought was the truth. He'd handcuffed her to the chair and threatened her. And she hadn't protested, hadn't defended herself because her own father had been raping her and letting his friends do it too. Steve must have seemed like one of the monsters to her.

He'd touched her, albeit only on her arms, and roughly manhandled her into the interrogation room. Restrained her. The idea of what she must have thought he was going to do to her had him running for the bathroom, slamming through the door and barely making the stall before he lost his lunch.  
  



	2. Chapter 2

Danny pushed open the door to the bathrooms tentatively, wondering what he was going to find inside. He'd seen Steve run out of the bullpen thirty minutes ago, about twenty minutes before he'd finished getting the basics from Alison. There was no way he was going to push her to talk more that day. So he had gotten Kono on the phone to the FBI to bring in a specialist team to interview the poor kid and to comb through the computers from the house.

CSI were sweeping Jervis's house too, because he had no doubt that a man who'd been abusing a little girl in real life would also have child pornography somewhere on his computer. He'd called Denning himself, letting the man know that there was bound to be fallout from what they'd discovered about the prosecutor. He just hoped that none of his cases fell apart, and that one little girl defending herself didn't lead to guilty people being let out of jail.

Chin had found thousands of images on Hale's laptop, some of them of Alison, but the vast majority were of other kids, probably from all over the world, and they needed the FBI to trace them. Danny also wanted to spare the team, and if he was honest himself too, from having to deal with the case at all. Just because he'd run this kind of investigation before, didn't mean he wanted to again. He certainly didn't want Kono or Steve wrapped up in it.

Kono was a fantastic police officer, dedicated and tough, but she was almost too good. She threw herself into cases, got herself so far under the skin of the crimes, that Danny couldn't help worrying about her burning out. Cases like Alison's screwed everybody up, and trying to get inside the head of either the perp or the vic caught you in a net that there was often no escape from. He wondered if he could get his old captain from Jersey to come out and have the same talk with Kono he'd had with Danny, the one that probably gave Danny's marriage another four years of life. He was pretty sure Eddie would be up for a working vacation, especially now he'd retired.

And then there was Steve.

If someone had told him two years ago that he'd be worrying about his partner as much as his victim, he'd have laughed at them. He'd have laughed even harder if they'd told him that the partner he was worrying about was a highly trained Navy SEAL.

Despite what Steve had said about missions being shades of gray, his world was very black and white. Bad guys were the enemy and needed punishing and the good guys needed saving. Doctors, even head shrinkers, always acted in the best interest of their patients, and when someone told him who the bad guys were, then god help them. And on top of that was a messy bundle of daddy issues that everyone except Steve could see.

Peering around the door, Danny saw Steve sat on the floor of the bathroom, his arms curled around his legs and his face hidden by his knees. At any other time Danny would have mocked him for how pathetic a picture he painted, but the right now he knew Steve was probably spiraling through every worse case scenario he could think of.

“Steve,” Danny said quietly, stepping closer to his partner. “Come on, babe. We need you back out there.”

“Danny,” Steve said brokenly, as if just his name would explain everything that Steve was feeling but was never going to say.

And maybe it did, because Danny couldn't help but sit down next to Steve, not caring what might be on the floor, nudging his shoulder into the larger man's. “It's okay.”

“It's not,” Steve objected, his voice muffled against his cargoes. “I was... Her own dad, Danny? Her father.”

There wasn’t much Danny could say to that. Steve might be terrible at vocalizing the things that hurt him, but Danny knew exactly what he meant. “My first case like this, I cried. At first. I cried when I held Grace, I cried when I watched my cousin's kids play Little League, I cried watching the news. How could anyone do that to kids? Especially their own parents. I'd always known it happened, it's on the news, but seeing it, seeing what a mess it made of the kids, that was something else. And in that case, there was no images.”

“Chin found some,” Steve said, turning his head so he was at least looking at Danny even if he was still curled in on himself.

“I know,” Danny said. He also knew what he said next was guaranteed to provoke a reaction from Steve. “There's several thousand images, mostly not of Alison. I've got the FBI sending a team to go through them.”

“What?” Steve demanded, raising his head and fixing Danny with a pale imitation of his usual mad-bad-SEAL glare.

“You heard what I said,” Danny told him calmly, refusing to let himself argue about it. “A, it's protocol with cases that are this big, and B, I don't want you guys looking through them.”

“You guys?” Steve parroted, obviously gearing himself up for a fight. “We need protecting from them, but you don't? Is that it? You do remember who's running this task force?”

Danny rolled his eyes, happy to let Steve get this off his chest. Anger was better than wallowing in the horror of what had been done to Alison, but he wasn't going to give ground on letting Steve see the images. “That I do, babe.”

“So why would you give the case to the FBI without asking me first? Why would you think that we can't handle it in the team?”

“Because, Steven,” Danny explained with exaggerated patience. “The longer you can go through life without having ever seen child porn, the better it is. If I could make sure you and Kono never saw it, I would. Once you've seen it, you'll never be able to un-see it. And trust me, I really wish I could have a do over on that one.”

“Jesus, Danny,” Steve murmured, deflating a little. His head didn't go back down to his knees, which Danny took as a win.

“Also, I'm not the one who just lost his lunch,” Danny pointed out with a tiny smirk.

It was kind of a mean thing to say, he knew that, but it was Steve, for god's sake. After all they'd been through in the last couple of years, everything he knew about the man, he was damn sure Steve could take a little ribbing, even about the awful things in life. Steve flipped him the bird, his hands unclenching from around his legs. More win.

Neither man spoke for a few minutes, Danny happy to keep his friend company as Steve sorted through whatever was going on in his head.

“I've seen some terrible things, D. Done some of them,” Steve said after a few minutes, his voice rough. “But this? What kind of parent does this?”

“If you try and work that out, babe, it'll send you crazy. Pedophiles are predators and they'll abuse any child they can who fits their preference. Although I think this guy got off as much on the power of making Alison into what he thought of as the perfect girl. The perfect victim.”

“How do you know so much about this stuff?” Steve asked, turning towards Danny a little, looking like he was genuinely interested in whatever wisdom his partner could pass on. “Was it just cases?”

“I was on the Special Victims unit for a year,” Danny said, surprised Steve didn’t know that already. “I thought you read my files?”

“I did, I just didn't realize what it meant, I suppose,” Steve admitted, looking like he was annoyed with himself. “I didn't think about anything other than your solve rate and the bald facts. I never thought about who the victims were, what you might have seen and done that could be worse than the things I'd seen.”

“Maybe not worse,” Danny said, thinking about IEDs and suicide bombers. “Just differently bad.”

“Differently bad?” Steve repeated, with a barely there smile.

“You got a better way to explain it, sailor?” Danny asked, pleased that Steve was getting himself back together.

Steve grinned as he shook his head, before straightening himself up and taking a deep breath. “I need to go and apologize to Alison.”

“That might not be such a good idea,” Danny said, hoping that Steve would still get his head together even if he wasn't allowed to fix his mistake. “She's still pretty fragile.”

“You didn't leave her on her own, did you?” Steve asked, standing up with the grace that never failed to make Danny jealous.

“Of course I didn't,” Danny snapped back, with a roll of his eyes at Steve's complete change in attitude to the girl. The big goof was such a sucker for kids, which was probably Grace's fault, it was a miracle that that head shrinking quack had been able to get him to believe him. He waved his hand in Steve's direction and his partner took the hint and pulled him up. “Billy Kama's with her.”

“The big guy?” Steve asked, obviously wondering why that man mountain was allowed to be with Alison when he wasn't.

“She asked for him,” Danny explained, brushing off the seat of his pants. “He's one of those quiet guys that kids and animals love.” He looked at his hands, and even though they seemed okay, moved to the washbasins. “It's like they're really still or something, and anything that's normally spooked by humans seems to trust them. There was a guy like that in the mounted division, back in Newark. Not as big as Kama, but still really built. I saw him hold out his hand once, to point at something, and a sparrow landed on it. And there was a time they were camping, a team bonding thing - don't get ideas, McGarrett - and they were all sat round the fire when a fox came up and sat down next to Jimmy. He didn't feed it, or anything, it just wanted to get warm.”

“And Alison trusts him?”

“I don't think she's going to trust anyone for a long time,” Danny said, drying off his hands. “But she's not frightened of him.”

Steve looked like he was about to throw up again, and Danny guessed that his partner might have a few lingering trust issues himself after the case was over. Realizing that some of the worst monsters out there looked just like everyone else was a lesson that all cops had to learn.

“We should get back out there and see what Kono's got,” Danny ordered, heading for the door. He wondered, briefly, if there was something else he could get McGarrett working on, but this was their only case and he couldn't really shut Steve out of it completely.

“I thought you'd called in the FBI?” Steve asked, following after him, and still sounding peeved at the idea of the FBI having anything to do with the case.

“To investigate and trace the kids in the pictures and do a detailed interview with Alison,” Danny explained, striding towards the bullpen. “We still have two deaths to investigate, and report on. And we have to find someone for Alison to stay with. No way am I turning her over to child services unless I really, really have to.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Kono looked up from the tech-table as Danny and Steve came through the doors into the Five-0 office. “Hey guys.”

“Kono,” Danny greeted her, while Steve, still looking a little gray around the edges, just nodded. “Did you find anything yet?”

“No relatives,” she answered, watching as Danny's face fell. “In fact, I can't really find out where Mathew Hale came from. He doesn't seem to exist in the system until he came to the island ten years ago.”

“That's...troubling,” Danny said, leaning on the table and looking at the scant evidence of the existence of the man who was both their victim and their perpetrator.

“I know, right? So I thought may be that wasn't his real name so I've got his prints running through AFIS and his photo in facial recognition.”

“Good,” Danny said, managing to look pleased with her initiative but frustrated with the lack of progress. “What's Chin up to?”

Kono looked over to her cousin's office and wondered if she shouldn't have offered to do the search. “He's going through the hard drive, looking at documents to see if there's more evidence there. Not just the pictures.”

“I should help him,” Steve said, already starting to turn to go to Chin.

“Not right now, babe,” Danny ordered, grabbing his forearm. “Kono's got some more to tell us.”

“She does?” Steve asked, looking perplexed at Danny's knowledge.

Kono would have been happy to let her other searches go unnoticed until they bore fruit, ignoring them if they didn't, but she should have realized that Danny would guess what she was doing from just a quick glance at a logo on the screen. “It was just a hunch.”

“Your hunches today have been great,” Danny said, smiling at her. “So let's hear this one.”

“I figured if Hale was using an assumed name,” Kono said, tapping on the logo she assumed Danny had spotted, even though it was minimized in the corner. “Then maybe he was on the run, and that there might be an missing person report on Alison.” She flicked the page for the Center for Missing and Exploited kids on to the large screen. “So far, I've not found anything, but then I don't really know what I'm looking for.”

“Sure we do,” Steve said before Danny could say anything. “We know, or can guess a few things. One, she'd have been six when she went missing, if we assume she came to the island at the same time as Hale.” Steve counted off the items on his fingers, his whole demeanor changing now he had something he could focus on. “Two, we know she's white, blonde, blue eyes, small build. Those things won't have changed.”

“Yeah,” Kono agreed, because she'd thought of that already. She scrolled through the list of about fifty girls who matched the broad criteria they had. “And that's just for the national list.”

“There's so many,” Steve breathed, obviously as horrified by the list as Kono had been.

“Over two thousand kids in this country alone go missing every single day,” Danny said, his voice matter of fact, even though his pained expression suggested he was trying hard not to really think about what that meant. “Most get found quickly, although some of the older ones don't want to be, and some of that number are kids abducted by parents so they know what happened. But there's about a hundred or so classic kidnappings a year.”

“Christ,” Steve said, still staring at the list of little blonde girls as though he could find them if he thought hard enough. “And we don't know if they even came from this country.”

“We could use facial recognition if we de-aged her picture,” Danny suggested, pulling out his phone. “Call up Fong and see if the lab's set up to do that, and I'll snap a picture of her.” He strode off towards his office, before remembering something and turning back. “And get on to the International Center for Missing and Exploited Children, they can do a search of their database too.”

“What can I do?” Steve asked, once Danny was in his office. Kono wondered if the question was entirely about what task she could give him, or if he wanted someone to tell him how to fix the mess he'd made of today.

“How about you call the International Center while I call the lab?” she said, stepping over to the tablet they had set up for video calls. “And you can stop beating yourself up over today, boss. If Danny isn't doing it for you, you don't need to.”

Steve huffed out a kind of a laugh, but didn't answer. Kono wasn't surprised. She didn't expect him to answer, or even really listen to her, but she figured he needed to hear it. Yes, he'd screwed up today, majorly, but he'd never make the same mistake. And given a slightly different set of circumstances, she could see herself making the same errors he had.

“Guys,” Chin called, rushing from his office before she'd dialed the lab. “You're gonna want to...I was going to say 'want' to see this, but want is the wrong word.”

“What is it?” Steve asked, sounding almost like he usually did.

“I was looking through Hale's hard drive, and the notebooks we took from the scene, when I found this.” Chin brought up the documents he'd found on the tech-table, opening what looked like several journal entries. “He used to keep paper notes, but switched last year to these digital notes.” Chin scrolled through the entries quickly, and Kono got the impression he was hoping neither her nor Steve had time to read them. “It's a complete document of everything that the bastard did to Alison. Almost like a scientific thesis.”

“Jesus,” Danny said, as he walked over from his office, phone in his hand. He looked wrecked, like the idea that everything that Hale had done to Alison being an experiment, was the last straw that finally cracked his control.

“I've not read it all,” Chin said, looking like he wished he hadn't read any of it. “But I happened to notice this entry when I skimmed through. And the name stood out.”

The entry on the screen was long, and Kono did her best to only skim the words, not think about what they meant. She knew she should be better at this, stronger, but there was no way she wanted to know the details of what that bastard did to his little girl. And then she saw it, the name Chin must have seen too.

John Anderson.

She re-read the paragraph surrounding the name, processing the words and felt like she might have to follow Steve's earlier action and rush to the bathroom. The psychiatrist had been abusing Alison, his supposed patient. She guessed she should have seen it coming, given that Hale had kept the girl away from pretty much anybody who might have been suspicious, but reading the stark, almost scientific record of exactly what Hale had watched him do, was horrifying.

“I am going to kill him,” Steve growled, and pushed away from the tech-table.

“Whoa there, cowboy,” Danny said, and Kono wondered what argument he could possibly make to slow Steve down. “Let's not be hasty. We should make him suffer first.”

Steve looked at the shorter man and gave him a tight grin, as they both strode out of the office.

“I'll send you his address,” Chin called after them, bringing up the man's details on the tech-table. “And I'll send HPD after you.”

“Is it very wrong that I kind of hope he resists arrest?” Kono asked, knowing the answer already but hoping Chin wouldn't judge her too much.

“No more wrong than me waiting a while before I send the back up.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Steve pulled the Camaro to the kerb nearly a block from Anderson's house, slipping the keys out of the ignition, and into his pocket. He pulled his gun from his belt and checked it, making sure he had a round in the chamber. “We'll have to split up, make sure he doesn't run.”

“You take the front,” Danny suggested, checking his own gun. “He's more likely to open the door to you than me. At least, he will if he thinks you still believe his bullshit.”

“You're not going to insist we wait for backup?” Steve asked, kind of surprised.

“Nope,” Danny said firmly, getting out of the car and opening the trunk. “But we will be wearing our vests, just in case the fucker has more of a spine than I think he does.”

“Okay.” Steve wasn't sure he'd ever seen Danny like this. The restrained version of his partner, silent, grimly set mouth and deep frown creasing his forehead, was kind of unsettling. And kind of cool. This was a version of Danny where you could see just how dangerous he could really be and Steve liked it, at least in the current circumstances.

They walked in silence along the street and up the drive. The house was ostentatious, almost smug, with visible steelwork, polished concrete and more lanais, decks and balconies than should have been physically possible on one house. Danny slipped quickly around the side of the garage, his steps silent on the pristine lawn. Steve slowed his pace along the path, giving Danny enough time to get to the back of the house in case Anderson bolted when he saw Steve at the front.

He passed under the Japanese torii style gate with a feeling of disgust. Torii gates were supposed to represent passing into a sacred space and the thought that Anderson somehow considered his home his sacred space made Steve's stomach roll. He rang the bell, schooling his face into something he hoped was determined but friendly, rather than what he really felt.

He wasn't sure what to expect from the man, if he was even going to answer the door. In the car Danny had given him a quick run down of his confrontation with Anderson in the Five-0 offices, so maybe he already suspected that the task force would be after him. He must have been supremely confident in his own ability to intimidate Alison and to blind investigators to what was going on if he'd dared coming to the crime scene instead of packing up his life and running. Maybe the guy was still convinced that his world wasn't about to collapse.

After a few moments of waiting Steve couldn't stand it any more. He gently tried the door handle, just in case, but it was firmly locked, and so he peered through the frosted glass on the front door. He couldn't see any movement inside, and a firm push at the door told him just how secure it was. He was debating if he should try to force the door in when he heard Danny shout from the back yard and the decision was made for him.

He hit the glass pane of the door smartly with the butt of his gun, and reached carefully through to pop the lock. He kicked the door wide open, his gun back up in front of him. He gave each of the wide spaces that opened off the hallway a cursory sweep, but mostly ignored them to get to the back of the house. It was a risk, but he was willing to take it to get to his partner.

The open lounge that spanned the rear of the house gave way, through open glass doors, to a huge sun deck with a massive hot tub. It was a realtors dream, although Steve suspected any prospective purchaser wouldn't be as pleased with the use the hot tub was being put to.

Danny had hold of Anderson's ankles, and was holding them high above the side of the tub, while the man himself struggled unsuccessfully to get his head back above the bubbling water. His arms flailed uselessly to gain a purchase on the sides, and his own buoyancy meant he couldn't reach the bottom of the tub to push himself up.

“The bastard came home and got in the tub,” Danny said, sounding both annoyed and surprised. “He didn't even have the decency to try to run away.”

“After dealing with me, he must have been pretty sure he was getting away with everything,” Steve said, feeling a bloom of shame grow again in his chest.

“Babe, the guy's a douche,” Danny said, lowering Anderson's ankles and letting his head bob up above the water. “Nothing to do with you.”

“McGarrett,” the psychiatrist gasped, spitting up water. “Please.”

“I'm sorry,” Steve said, not lowering his gun completely but taking a step closer to the tub. “I didn't quite catch that.”

“He's trying to kill me,” Anderson coughed, still flailing his arms.

“No, I'm using reasonable force to stop you resisting arrest. This is reasonable, right? I mean, you're not seeing anything wrong here, are you? Cause if you are, I'll stop right now.”

“Seems fine to me,” Steve said, a smile creeping on to his face. “In fact, I think he might be resisting some more.”

“I think you're right, Steven,” Danny said, yanking Anderson's ankles up again and plunging his head backwards, under the water. “We wouldn't want him getting away.”

“I should check the rest of the house,” Steve said, Joe's voice sounding in his head, telling him the place wasn't secure. “We probably shouldn't drown him.”

“There's no we in this, babe,” Danny pointed out, shaking Anderson's legs back and forth for emphasis. “This is all Danny Williams, irate father.”

“Just don't forget that Danny Williams, decorated cop, will be pissed in the morning if he's charged with killing the guy.”

“Pffft,” Danny said by way of response, but Steve could tell he was pulling back from whatever place he'd gone thinking about Grace. He was about to turn back towards the house when he heard sirens in the distance, and figured their time alone with the psychiatrist would soon be over, no doubt thanks to Chin.

Steve was kind of pleased, he didn't want Danny to feel like he'd done, or not done, anything that he'd regret in the future. Anderson would get processed through the courts, he'd get sent away for a long, long time, and Steve would go to every single one of the guy's parole hearings to make sure he stayed where he belonged. Steve still felt a burning anger at being fooled by the man, something he was never going to forget, and as much as he wanted to kill him for what he'd done to the girl, he needed Anderson alive as a reminder of his own stupidity.

He imagined testifying in court about how Anderson had lied to him and the jury reading the account Alison's father had written, and how horrified they'd be. A doctor molesting his patient, encouraging her father to do the same, would have every member of the jury baying for his blood.

His good mood evaporated when he realized Alison would have to testify. Anger flared again, this time directed at Anderson rather than himself, and he wanted nothing more than to protect the kid. “I could make it look like suicide.”

“What's that, babe?” Danny said, letting Anderson's legs down so the spluttering, choking man popped up from under the water. “I thought I heard you say you could make it look like suicide, but I'm sure that's just water in my ears.”

“He's going to get some fancy, high priced lawyer, who's going to put Alison on the stand.” Steve took a step forward, holstering his gun, ignoring his instincts to search the house. “She can't, Danny. It's not fair.”

“Of course it isn't,” Danny said, something of his normal, expressive anger creeping back to replace the quiet fury of earlier.

Something unclenched inside Steve. This was the Danny he knew, the one who made him feel at home in his own skin, the one who shouted instructions to help him navigate through the maze of civilian life. The urge to kill Anderson retreated a little and it was mostly for form that Steve continued. “I could make it look like he felt guilty, slit his own wrists in the hot tub, and bled out.”

Danny eyed him suspiciously for a few moments, and Steve wondered if he was actually considering it, before he dunked the still gasping Anderson again. He rolled him over and manhandled the slippery psychiatrist over the edge of the tub.

“No, we're going to let him have his day in court,” Danny said, pulling some zip-ties out of his pocket. “But we are going to do everything we can to make sure that Alison doesn't have to testify. We are going to tear his life apart, look under every little stone of his existence and then use every horrific detail against him. We are going to sit him in interrogation, naked as a jaybird, and remind him of all the unpleasant things people do to child molesters in jail.”

By the time he finished his little speech, Danny had Anderson's hands secured behind his back, and was bending over speaking right into the man's ear. Steve wasn't sure if the man was even conscious, let alone listening to Danny's threats, but it didn't matter. Between them, all of them, they were going to get the guy to confess and take a plea to a hefty jail term, saving Alison from having to face him in court.

“Once uniform get here we should search the house,” Steve said, trying to shove himself back into his normal work persona but finding it didn't fit quite like it had. “You could run me through what to look for.”

Danny flashed him a soft smile, one of those rare ones he saved mostly for Grace. “You already know what to look for, babe. Today doesn't change the fact that you're a good cop.”

Steve felt a swell of pride at Danny's praise, even if it was still tinged with shame from his actions today. And for all Danny said the words, probably even believed them, Steve still wanted to learn from his partner, and the rest of his team. As the uniforms came around the side of the house, guns drawn and warnings shouted, he watched Danny take control of the scene and order HPD to take their prisoner to headquarters. Steve was more than happy to take a backseat on this arrest. His team had done all the work, saved him from making a terrible mistake, and he was going to make sure the governor knew it.

“Stop thinking of ways to punish yourself,” Danny ordered, taking Steve's elbow and steering him towards the house. “You made a mistake. Learn from it and move on, or the job will eat you alive. You know this already, so there's no point telling you, really, but I will. And I'll keep repeating it until I'm satisfied you're listening to me.”

Steve felt himself relax. Danny wasn't holding today's fuck up against him, they'd caught the guy, saved the girl, kind of, and things were going to be okay. Yes, his view of the world had shifted, another piece of darkness creeping into his heart, but that was fine. Right even. He was going to move on, as Danny said, but he was always going to remember Alison, and what had happened to her. “We should call Chin and Kono, a CSI team, and rip this place apart.”

“Not rip, Steven,” Danny said as he pulled out his phone. “We are going to methodically, and carefully search the house. We are going to leave the place in pristine condition, if we can, because then it can be sold for lots of money to help fund the massive damages Alison is going to get when she sues Anderson.

Steve grinned as he followed Danny inside the house, a sense of pride in his team pushing away some of the guilt. Yes, he was going to move on, and his team were going to be there to ensure he did.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Steve watched from the safety of his office as Alison was steered through the glass doors into the Five-0 headquarters by Billy Kama. Three days had passed since the shooting and Steve had become more and more intimidated by Officer Kama. It wasn't that the guy was physically bigger than Steve, and from everything he'd heard pretty useful in a fight, it was that the man was just as amazing as Kono said.

Alison, or rather Sarah as they now knew she was really called, seemed to adore the man. Steve wasn't jealous, at least he was fairly sure he wasn't, but he was genuinely baffled as to why the kid didn't seem to be at all intimidated by the huge, gruff guy. She still did most of her talking to Danny, which didn't surprise Steve, but she would sit for hours in Officer Kama's silent presence, shrinking behind him if anyone she didn't know approached her. He was the only one who could touch her without having to ask permission first, even though he always did.

None of his team, himself included, had been willing to turn Sarah over to child services while they investigated the case and her background. Instead they'd used a safe house, manned by Billy and a female FBI special agent that Sarah seemed to tolerate. Danny and Kono stopped by a lot too, when the kid wasn't in their offices.

Steve had barely spoken to her, remembering Danny's words about trust and the lack of it, but today would probably be the team's last interaction with her and he was still determined to apologize for his behavior. He was just terrified to actually do it.

He'd driven the team hard in the past three days, not that they needed any encouragement from him, to try to make up for the harm he'd caused. His team had understood his motives, letting his frustrations and guilt wash over them, but the FBI team were seriously pissed at him. He didn't care though, because they had found Sarah's parents.

Sarah Anne Chesterton was in fact fourteen, not sixteen, and had been kidnapped from her parent's front garden in Ericsson, Minneapolis when she was just four years old. The case had been cold for years, with most people thinking the little girl was dead, but her parents had never given up hope that she was alive. Steve had found it hard to swallow past the lump in his throat when he'd read the family's website, telling their story and asking for any information about their missing daughter.

He was immensely pleased that he and his team could be involved in reuniting the parents with their missing child, but he also felt a sense of guilt that they hadn't found the girl sooner. He knew it was stupid to feel responsible for the kid's suffering but it shouldn't have taken her shooting two people, no matter what they did to her, for her to have been found. He was going to have to do something to make sure that didn't happen again.

“Babe,” Danny said from his spot on Steve's sofa, without looking up from the folder he was reading. “I can hear you guilt-tripping from here.”

“I'm not,” Steve said, the denial more for appearances sake than anything. Danny knew him better than anyone else ever had, and that was only scary some of the time, but Steve was willing to concede that he was probably projecting his feelings in neon letters ten feet high right now.

“You are,” Danny insisted, shutting the case file and looking up at Steve. “But I'm not going to argue with you about it. We've got about ten minutes before Sarah's parents arrive and I want us all to be cool, calm and collected when they get here. It's going to be tough enough as it is.”

Steve had always taken pride in reuniting families, getting people back to where they belonged, but this one had him tied in knots. They'd been apart for ten years, and those ten years had done terrible things to both Sarah and her parents. The focus was, probably rightly, on the girl, but the parents had lost an innocent four year old and were getting back an incredibly damaged teenager. “You think they'll make it?”

“I don’t know,” Danny replied, his shoulders slumping a little. “I can't imagine what they're going through, what they've been through. If I lost Grace, I'm not sure I'd last ten years.”

“You would,” Steve insisted, knowing without doubt that Danny would never give up looking. “And you wouldn't be on your own.”

Danny smiled at him, a small, soft quirk of his lips, but fond amusement lighting his eyes. “You'd tear the world apart looking for her, wouldn't you?”

“You know it, Danny.” Steve would. So would the rest of the team. He just wished every parent, and every kid, had the people with their skills looking out for them.

“Once this is over, at least our part, I've got some suggestions for you,” Danny said, standing up and flexing his knee.

“What suggestions?” Steve asked, standing up too. “It's not going to involve the FBI, is it?”

“What part of once this is over did you not understand?” Danny demanded, his hand slicing through the air in irritation. “Sit down you giant goof, I'm just stretching my legs.”

Steve sat, not wanting to do anything that could affect Sarah, who was sat in Danny's office with Billy Kama. But he was itching to know what it was Danny was thinking. It wasn’t like his partner didn't know that telling him there was a secret he couldn't know was going to drive him crazy. “Can I have a clue?”

“It's like you're five, isn't it?” Danny said, rolling his eyes in exasperation. “Grace is more patient than you.”

“She's nine,” Steve pointed out, trying to school his face into something that Danny wouldn't be forced to name.

“Oh well,” Danny said, throwing his hands in the air. “That makes all the difference.”

“Look...” Steve started, wishing Danny would just tell him and get it over with. They had time, after all, and he'd be fine with just knowing the basics of what his partner was thinking.

“How did you survive in the Navy?” Danny asked, looking like he was actually expecting an answer. “You're like Great Aunt Maude's cat who couldn't stand closed doors. Used to throw itself at the bathroom door until you let it in, and then it did the same until you let it out. I swear it gave me a complex about peeing at her house. Well, that and how she checked the bathroom after you went in case you left a mess.”

“A cat?”

“Big, stupid thing with a taste for buttercream frosting,” Danny said with a grin, his eyes crinkling with amusement. “She called it Fluffykins.”

“And that reminds you of me?” Steve asked, trying to decide what offended him most. “Really?”

“Well, you do like buttercream, Fluffykins,” Danny said with a laugh, jumping back to avoid the punch Steve aimed at his thigh. “And you have a slightly scary lady who rubs your belly for you.”

Steve blinked, his train of thought derailed by Danny's statement. “Cath's not scary. And it's not my belly she rubs.”

“Too much information, McGarrett,” Danny all but yelled, his hands going to his ears.

“You started it,” Steve pointed out, feeling the tension of the past few days bleeding away in the face of Danny's outrage. “And you should tell me about your suggestions.”

“Jeez,” Danny sighed, settling back down to lean against Steve's desk. “You really are like a dog with a bone.”

“I just want to know,” Steve complained, knowing he probably sounded like a whining kid, especially when Danny raised his eyebrow. “Please.”

“Okay, okay,” Danny said, caving in with a sigh. “You know I can't resist the Puss in Boots eyes. What? Don't look at me like that, you've seen Shrek.”

“I do not have cat eyes.”

“You so do,” Danny said with a smirk. “And the patience of a toddler. Which is why I'm going to tell you the basics now so I can have a few minutes peace when Sarah's parents arrive.”

“That's all I wanted in the beginning,” Steve pointed out, wavering between annoyed and amused by the whole conversation. “We could have been done by now if you'd just told me right away.”

“We'll never be done, babe,” Danny muttered, his irritation was so obviously fake that Steve couldn't help but grin at him.

“Come on, Danno.”

“Jeez. Okay, I was thinking that I could invite my old captain from SVU out here, he's retired so he'll be able to fit us in, and he could spend some time with the team.”

“Is that all?” Steve asked, wondering why Danny hadn't just told him that right away.

“Isn't it enough? The man's got fifteen years experience as a captain, ten of those in SVU, and you're just going to dismiss that? Well, how about we get the HPD SVU folks in too? And that you take the detective exam rather than just reading the books?”

“I was planning on doing the test when I had time,” Steve admitted, knowing that he'd probably pass but still feeling that he was missing the personal experience that Danny and Chin had.

“We'll make time, and you'll sail through,” Danny told him, barely breaking the stride of his rant and thankfully not commenting when Steve felt his face flush with pride. “And then we can ask Lori to recommend someone in the BAU to come over and give us all some intensive training in profiling abusers.”

“That sounds good,” Steve agreed, willing to forgo his current aversion to the FBI to work with the BAU. They were the best of the best and it made sense to learn everything they could from them.

“Of course it does,” Danny said, as though all his rants were this sensible. “But right now we need to help this couple get to know their daughter again.”

Steve looked out of his office to see Chin leading in Sarah's parents. Steve felt his stomach clench up again at the sight of them. They both looked worn out and exhausted, and he suspected that wasn't just because of the long flight and FBI debrief. What was he going to say to them?

“You'll do fine, babe,” Danny said, reading his mind again. “We'll do fine.”

“I just feel like nothing we say or do can ever fix this.”

“It can't,” Danny said sadly, watching the couple look around the bullpen and catch sight of their daughter sat in Danny's office. “But we can make sure that for the next few days they have nothing to worry about but getting to know each other again. That's all we can do.”

Steve didn't reply. What was there to say? Instead he stood up and squared his shoulders, schooled his face into something he hoped was suitable to given the gravity of the situation, and opened his office door. He was going to do everything he could to help this family, and to try to make sure no other parents or children had to go through what the Chestertons had. If he achieved nothing else, then that was surely worth something.

~fin~


End file.
